A Brief Introduction to the Narmada Issue

The controversy over large dams on the River Narmada has come to symbolise
the struggle for a just and equitable society in India. The story is long
and complicated and will take a long time to tell. In brief, the
Government's plan is to build 30 large, 135 medium and 3000 small dams to
harness the waters of the Narmada and its tributaries. The proponents of
the dam claim that this plan would provide large amounts of water and
electricity which are desperately required for the purposes of
development.

Opponents of the dam question the basic assumptions of the
Narmada Valley Development Plan
and believe that its planning is unjust and inequitous
and the cost-benefit analysis is grossly inflated in favour of building
the dams. It is well established that the plans rest on untrue and
unfounded assumptions of hydrology and seismicity of the area and the
construction is causing large scale abuse of human rights and displacement
of many poor and underprivileged communities. They also believe that water
and energy can be provided to the people of the Narmada Valley, Gujarat
and other regions through alternative technologies and planning processes
which can be socially just and economically and environmentally
sustainable.

Through this web site we shall endeavour to present the view of the
poor and underprivileged affected by the dams and the people's movements
they have created (primarily the Narmada Bachao Andolan) which are
leading the crusade for justice and the Right to Life of the many
inhabitants of the Narmada valley.

We recognise the complexity
of the issues involved. However, once one cuts through all the rhetoric,
lies and subterfuge of the vested interests, the gross inequities are
clear. Large numbers of poor and underprivileged communities (mostly
tribals and dalits) are being dispossessed of their livelihood and even
their ways of living to make way for dams being built on the basis of
incredibly dubious claims of common benefit and "national interest". For
us, this is simply immoral and therefore unacceptable. No purported
benefits can be used to justify the denial of the fundamental rights of
individuals in a democratic society. And given the evidence of past
megadam schemes in India and elsewhere and what has already happened in
the Narmada Valley, we believe that the promised benefits will never be
realised.

A quick look at the ground reality would disabuse anyone of the
real nature of the dam-builder's enterprise. Large dams imply large
budgets for related projects leading to large profits for a small group of
people. A mass of research shows that even on purely technical grounds,
large dams have been colossal failures. While they have delivered only a
fraction of their purported benefits, they have had an extremely
devastating effect on the riverine ecosystem and have rendered destitute
large numbers of people (whose entire sustenance and modes of living are
centered around the river). For no large dam in India has it been shown
that the resettled people have been provided with just compensation and
rehabilitation. At a more abstract level, the questions that arise in the
Narmada Struggle challenge the dominant model of development (of which
Sardar Sarovar dam is a prime example)
that holds out the chimerical
promise of material wealth through modernisation but perpetuates an
inequitous distribution of resources and wreaks social and environmental
havoc.

We would like to emphasise that the water problems of drought-prone
areas of Gujarat, like Kutch, Saurashtra and North Gujarat (the
Government's raison d'etre for the dam) are admittedly real.
However given the nature of the plans for Sardar Sarovar, it will never
solve these problems. On the contrary, in the shadow of the costliest
project ever undertaken in India, it is unlikely that alternative schemes
that would genuinely address these problems would be implemented. Sardar
Sarovar takes up over 80% of Gujarat's irrigation budget but has only 1.6%
of cultivable land in Kutch, 9% of cultivable land in Saurashtra and 20%
cultivable land in North Gujarat in its command area. Moreover, these
areas are at the tail-end of the command and would get water only after
all the area along the canal path get their share of the water, and that
too after 2020 AD. In summary, all available indicators suggest that these
needy areas are never going to benefit from the
Sardar Sarovar Project.

In simple terms, the struggle over the river Narmada holds a
mirror to our national face and challenges our commitment to professed
ideals of justice, equality and democracy.